A.Writing Task 1- the Plan

All you need for A. Writing Task 1 now is just a simple plan of 3-4 paragraphs because you are just going to write a summary of the information you are given. Please remember that because lots of my students have the tendency to make this task more difficult than it actually is!

So, in your first paragraph which is your introduction, you mainly paraphrase the topic given and the most important points by stating what you can see in the diagram. Here’s our topic:

What does the chart show? The annual profit of four companies during four years. These are the main points of the topic that we need to consider and include in our introduction; we just need to paraphrase them. So, we have:

Intro: “This chart follows the performance of four major international companies in terms of their annual income over the course of four years: from 2011-2014“.

That’s it! Our introduction will be ready in no time especially if you practice paraphrasing introductions enough.

In your 2nd paragraph what you need to do is to state the most important data you can see. I know that this can be quite overwhelming sometimes but just start from the most obvious information you see. Start stating the highest values and the lowest ones.

For example, your notes could be like that:

2nd paragraph (summary of data):

The annual profit of Grow+Flow was the lowest in 2011

The profits of ABC10 skyrocketed in 2014

MegaMarket was the most profitable in 2011 but then…

This is what you do. You follow each company in this case and you just describe their performance, starting from the most exceptional data to help you. You can include this summary of the diagram in this paragraph.

In the next paragraph you start making comparisons. You don’t have to write a lot or include each and every thing. No! Just be clear and specific and choose the most important or obvious correlations according to your own opinion. So, your plan notes for the 3rd paragraph could look like that:

3rd paragraph (comparisons):

Both the profits of Grow+Flow and and TodayGlobal decreased in 2014.

From 2012 – 2014 MegaMarket and Grow+Flow are closely aligned.

With the exception of ABC10 all the rest have significantly dropped in terms of profit, etc.

(Always be simple! You have no idea what you can gain with that. Students think that if their phrasing is too simple they will lose marks, but really, the only way to lose marks is with convoluted phrasing that leads to grammatical and syntactical mistakes. So, what I say is, better be simple than sorry.)

Lastly, you have to add your conclusion. Mainly, in a conclusion you just wrap-up the main points in the diagram. If you think you know a reason why some profits dropped or raised you can form your opinion now as a conclusion but this opinion of yours must always be based on what is shown in the diagram. So, here’s what your notes could be:

Conclusion:

it seems that financial crisis resulted in dropping profits

only one company steadily increased

As an example, you can begin your conclusion: [“To sum-up, the diagram shows that the international financial crisis has affected the majority of the companies because….”]

This is your plan! Now you are ready to go and easily write that essay. Ideally, with enough practice this plan would take you no time to be formed; your notes will be written at the spot. However, if you are just starting out, it will prove to be very helpful!

If you prefer watching than reading, here you go:

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